The White Tiger and The Scorpion
by AmandaFriend
Summary: Post season 5 speculation. Booth wants to move on and Brennan wants to move forward, but they are separated by more than time and space. As with so much of their relationship, neither one is really aware of what the other one wants.
1. The White Tiger

**The White Tiger And The Scorpion**

_**Disclaimer**__: I do not own Bones, I simply use the characters for entertainment purposes only. Then I give them back to their respective owners for safekeeping._

_**Author's note: **__This follows Brennan and Booth's time in Asia post-season 5, but considers the introduction of that dreaded significant other and what it might do to our dynamic duo. _

_I think Booth's words—things have got to change—are prophetic for the series and the couple_

_We do not know __**IF**__ B&B will write one another while they are away from each other; in fact, it is entirely possible that they set up the coffee cart/reflecting pool rendezvous because they planned on not communicating. I'd like to think that they will correspond, but like so much since the infamous 100__th__ episode, the conversations will be awkward and difficult given the distances between them both physically and emotionally. Booth might take this opportunity to really cut himself loose, especially if he can find other distractions. Brennan, on the other hand, might actually get up the nerve to take the next step. _

_So, gentle reader, please find my speculations about the year-long separation and what it might mean for Booth and Brennan. . . ._

_**Word count: **__11,914_

Only twenty-five more minutes, he tells himself. He's been nursing his coffee for the past 40 minutes or so, trying to put words on the paper he's brought from his quarters. It's almost three in the afternoon there in Washington while it's pushing 1 a.m. here in Afghanistan. He needs the extra caffeine to deal with the late hour and the opportunity to talk to Parker via webcam. He's waited almost a month since he last saw Parker although he's written several letters and posted daily emails to his son.

But this time it is different. _Parker and Pops_. Two of his favorite people.

Pops has gotten several letters over the last few weeks just trying to set this up. Seeley Booth wants to see him. Talk to him. Know that he's doing all right at the nursing home.

Seeing is believing.

So he is surprised as he is waiting for that magic hour when he can turn on the computer and talk to his son and grandfather that the desert seems to pull her out of thin air.

She is dressed in Army colors and blends into the drab landscape he calls home. But she has a different quality about her that makes her stand out from the Army-issued women here. She is only about 5'5" and wears her long blonde hair pulled back so that it trails down her back almost to her waist.

Instead of the Army nod in which one soldier acknowledges another with the silent cocking of the head, she smiles.

It's a 1000 watts of pure something he hasn't seen for a long time. Happiness? Joy?

In a war zone?

He sits and waits and wonders who she is. No, he knows who she is. She's press. There have been a few of them on the base. Mostly talking to soldiers and getting reactions to a set of questions that are the same—how long have you been here? How long do you have to go? How do you see the mission?

He's an investigator in that other life he's been missing for the last 3 months. He knows how to question people, how to push their buttons and get them to give up the truth. Even after the brain surgery and the doubt and the fear that something had been excised from his head besides the tumor, he is certain that he is good at questioning people. He can't read them as well as he used to—maybe it has something to do with the tumor, maybe not, but he can read this woman who is so different that she ought to have some sort of a spotlight to travel with her.

She's looking for more than a story.

She's making connections with soldiers. Taking names. Promising to get in touch with family members. Friends. Let them know how each of them is doing.

He's not surprised when she settles into the seat opposite from him and sighs heavily just as she is putting a thick notebook on the table and looks up at him.

She smiles.

It's a 1000 watts of something he has not seen in a long time. Probably since he left Washington, D.C. Probably since before he left the Hoover that night with. . . .

He hasn't been using that name. He's barely answered her emails. Barely answered her letters.

They haven't coordinated phone calls—she's only a couple hours away time zone-wise. Two and a half hours away by the clock. Five hours by plane. Hell, they're technically on the same continent although they are light years away from each other.

But he drives those thoughts from his head just as he's been trying to do for the last 3 months.

Yeah, he cares. Cares deeply. Too deeply.

Yeah, he really does want to know what the hell is going on with her. He wants to do more than skim her letters, pass his eyes over those emails. But he gives them little time.

He is moving on.

He laughs aloud as if he's made a joke—and in a way, he knows he has— and he sees the woman's reaction across from him. She smiles. She looks like she knows something.

"Who is she?" she asks.

The voice has a warmth to it that draws him in. He shakes his head. He's trying to use the distance to find perspective. Give them a shot at being partners when they both get back from these occupational detours.

Something has to change and in the absence of her changing or the circumstances changing, the only thing he can control is himself.

"I'm waiting to call my son. My grandfather." He shrugs a shoulder and turns back to the coffee. He gulps it down and thinks about another. He nods at her cup.

"You need a refill?"

This is what passes for polite society on an Army base. For years he read the woman who sat opposite from him and knew when she was hungry and thirsty and tired and a myriad of other things. Now he has to ask. He has to learn to read other women. It's part of the new training.

She shakes her head and smiles. "Will you be right back?"

The question surprises him. Hell.

He knows he's giving her an odd look.

"Just thought you'd be someone to talk to."

"And you get lonely here."

He nods at the soldiers who are populating the mess hall. There's always someone here, 24-7. There are islands of people here—some are single islands, some larger groups, like the Malapocanos. . . . He squelches the thought.

"No, I thought you'd be someone interesting to talk to." She smiles. He likes that smile despite himself. "That's all."

He looks at the notepad that is bulging with slips of paper from soldiers who have given her messages to loved ones.

He gives her a nod and rises to get his third cup of coffee. It's lukewarm and tastes thick going down, but he appreciates the fact that it is strong. He might not sleep for days because of it, but seeing Parker and Pops together will counteract the coffee-induced insomnia. He'll have to thank Rebecca for making it happen. And Cam. God bless them both.

And he sits down at the same table to wait for his turn at the computer. He scans the piece of paper that he's been trying to fill with his thoughts. This is one of those times when he wishes he could just talk to her face-to-face and tell her that he isn't abandoning her. He's just trying to give them a shot at being partners. He needs to find someone else who will fulfill his needs. But the words won't come.

He looks up frustrated.

She has been studying her notebook, recording the slips of paper on a separate sheet. Her handwriting is neat and orderly, something he would not expect from a journalist.

"If I don't write them down, I'll forget them." She says this without looking up and he wonders if she is merely talking to herself. "It would be wrong to forget."

For a moment he thinks that she is normal. More Angela than. . . .

He's banned that name from his mind unless there is a letter or an email. She hasn't tried to phone him although a satellite hook-up would be easy enough. . . .

Closing his eyes, he lets the coffee do its trick.

"You never answered my question." The voice is back.

"What question?" He is counting the minutes until he can get online and talk to Parker and Pops.

"Who is she?"

What the hell is this? He is reminded of Pops making a comment about how men used to join the French Foreign Legion to forget a woman. _Beau Geste_, was it? Saturday morning movies on the local channel with Pops and Jared. As boys they would do their morning chores during the commercials, competing to see who could clean the most in the short time between movie segments.

"I'm waiting to call my son and my grandfather. They're going to be together. It's a pretty big deal, my grandfather thinks the Internet is mostly for porn."

He doesn't know why he said it exactly that way, but it's true and it's Pops.

And she smiles.

He could get lost in that smile. It's been a while since a woman has smiled at him like that.

"My grandmother thinks it's a conspiracy of some kind. Al Gore and his minions trying to take over the world and make us all tree huggers or something." She gives him a lopsided grin. "She's convinced the Internet is all some kind of weird conspiracy."

He can't help himself, but he smiles back. She's forthright and pretty and nice. Just nice.

He thinks that Hodgins would get a kick out of this conversation. Despite the fact that he's not trying to think about the Jeffersonian or the nerd posse he's left behind, he can't help but conjure their memories. He misses them. All of them.

"Booth. Sergeant Major."

"You're not telling me something I can't find out by just looking." Her finger points toward his nametag and the insignia. She shakes her head, still smiling. "Carrie. Carrie Ann Schneider. Independent Wire Services." Her hand reaches across the table and he takes it.

"Special Agent Seeley Booth." He grins at her. "In my other life."

"FBI." The tone is reverent. "I would have guessed you were a cop in your other life. Get tired of wearing suits? Want to live on the wild side?"

She leans in. "Or are you on the lookout for bin Laden?"

"Naw," he drawls, "that's CIA domain. I'm simply here to train."

She smirks and quirks her eyebrows. Her eyes are hazel. "I'm impressed. Or depressed. They're scouring the rolls looking for anybody who can help them out of this mess."

He sighs and in it he knows how true that is. They recruited him and at least a dozen more like him. Specialists. People with special training in the real world who can come back into the military and train others so that they can end this war. End this mess.

"There's a story here." She folds her hands in front of her and waits.

"You want my story?" He's spent years in the shadows of the fame of one Temperance. . . . He closes that door again and sits back.

"She must have wound you around her finger for you to be so, so wound up." Carrie leans forward. "When's your call?"

He checks his watch. "In twenty." He glances at the computer center off the mess and sees it's still pretty full. He signed up for his slot earlier that week. It's his regular time with Parker. Rebecca, for all her faults, has been pretty consistent.

"Twenty minutes, twenty questions."

"You want to interview me?"

He's been interviewed a lot over the years. He's lectured, too. With a solve rate in the 90s and world-famous partner, he got noticed.

"Okay. Hit me with your best shot."

It's meant to be funny, and he knows it's flirtatious. He grins at her.

"Okay, if the call is in twenty minutes, why have you been here for an hour swilling that brew," she points her chin toward his cup, "rather than writing your letter?"

He shrugs.

"Cam said she might be able to get us on earlier."

"She's the ex."

He laughed. "No. She's not the ex. Although, technically, she is an ex."

"This is _Days of Our Lives_ good, now."

"No." He shakes his head, but he can't keep the grin off his face. "She's a colleague. I work with her at the Jeffersonian."

Carrie Schneider is impressed. He's impressed a woman without doing more than dropping a name. For a second, he's impressed that the mere mention of that institution has the woman enraptured in his presence. "You work with the Jeffersonian?" She leans back in her chair and begins a slow nod. "You're that guy."

"Special Agent Seeley Booth."

"FBI guy. Comes over here to train soldiers in the fine art of detecting and apprehending suspected terrorists. Shore up the Afghan police force. Works with Dr. Temperance Brennan at the Jeffersonian to detect and apprehend suspected murderers using forensic techniques some of which were pioneered through the Jeffersonian."

The name gets to him. That's why he's tried to put it deep into some closet in his mind so that it won't do what it's doing to his stomach right now. He realizes his feelings are bittersweet. Carrie Ann Schneider knows more about him than he wants which gives him some sweet satisfaction. But it is the other part that seems bitter.

It is bitter. In spite of the distance of time and space he has not been able to completely shake the bitter.

"Cam's not _the_ ex."

He shakes his head.

"How old is Parker?"

"Ten."

He leans back and lets her study him.

"The ex-wife. . . is not the ex. Ex-lover, but not the ex in question."

"There is no ex-wife." He is willing to supply this much. He actually is enjoying this. Being interrogated rather than being the interrogator. And being interrogated by a pretty woman is well worth it.

"Then it's an ex-lover who has you tied in knots."

This time he leans in, way in as if to intimidate her. "There is no ex-lover. I'm over here to save lives by training men how to do their jobs better."

He notices that she does not flinch one iota from his attempt to invade her personal space. In that, she is similar to the ex-partner he is so desperately trying not to think about. The line he gave her? It's his standard line when someone asks. But he knows it is more complicated than that.

"You," she says firmly, "are a bad liar. There was a woman involved. A woman who has some kind of hold on you. You have all the markings."

This woman reminds him of Cam and Tessa and Rebecca and all the other women who have come and gone in his life. She is smart and sexy and attractive and too willing to tell him what she thinks. He has always sought out women like that. Like this. Or do they seek him out?

"Dr. Temperance Brennan."

He knows he did not flinch, did not move a muscle, and he is proud of himself at the mention of her name that he can do that much.

"She's my partner. That's all."

And there it is. That smile. She knows, or at least, she thinks she knows.

"My ex, my partner," she says with an exaggeration that is meant to hide some of the pain and show him that she knows what he is feeling, "was knocking boots with anything in a skirt."

"Well, mostly they were out of the skirt by the time he got to them," she adds, her voice low and meant to spin what must have been hard to find out. He's heard the story all too often and he's sympathetic. "Although I never quite saw the attraction to wearing boots while having sex."

In spite of himself, he laughs. And she laughs. She has an impossibly impish look and her voice sells the line. "So, he's out of the picture, though he's not entirely out of my life." For several moments she goes through a large paper file envelope and seems to be looking for something. She eventually pulls out a folded piece of paper, a news article, and slides it across the table to him. "I cheated, by the way. You're one of the reasons that I'm haunting the mess hall in the wee hours."

Unfolding it, he realizes it's an article from the _Journal_ that featured the doings of the Jeffersonian forensics lab—Dr. Temperance Brennan off to Indonesia to make history and, oh, by the by, her partner of five years, Special Agent Seeley Booth of the FBI is heading off to a war zone to train soldiers.

Cam sent him a copy along with the write-up in the Jeffersonian magazine about the dig in Maluku. There was a photo of _her_ in the piece. Mostly of her wearing a baseball cap looking down on a skeleton like she had done dozens of times.

He's seen that image before. She didn't have to go to Malakoonahonie to bend over remains.

"Christopher Schneider." Her finger traces something on the article and he has to think about it before he realizes her gesture is meant to direct him to the byline. Christopher Schneider, special to the _Journal_. "He sent it to me. Along with the divorce papers."

"I'm sorry," he hears himself say and he means it.

"I read people fairly well. I got home and found him very attentive and guilty as hell."

"Again, I'm sorry."

With a sigh, she purses her lips and leans in. "The best piece of advice someone ever gave me was to give a little of myself, share something and you'll generally get someone to share a little bit of themselves." Carrie grins, then raises her eyebrows. "Great advice for a journalist. But you don't want to talk about her."

He shakes his head. He had thought hundreds of miles apart with little communication on his part might do the trick. But he finds that more and more he wants to talk to her. He wants to hear her voice. Wants to hit a rewind button and start all over.

He drinks in the photo that accompanies the _Journal_ article. It's the two of them soon after the Maceivic trial. It's an unguarded moment, but it's them at their best. Even in black and white Bones is beautiful.

"Just don't make the mistake I did," she is saying and he wonders why he has such a hard time concentrating when he's not on duty, "and tell yourself you won't think about her."

"Why?" He's been telling himself that very thing for the last several weeks and it hasn't done much except distract him more.

"Try it. Don't think about white tigers."

The image pops into his head instantly. The tiger even growls.

"Simple psychology. Tell yourself that to maintain your sanity, you need to stop thinking about something. But it makes you insane because there you are sitting and thinking about it."

For a moment he thinks about Sweets and wonders if the good doctor would have given him something as pithy and useful. The tiger is growling in the background as he thinks about the young psychologist. It's partly because of him that he took the gamble.

He always hated losing at gambling.

"Hey Booth!" His head involuntarily seeks the voice. "You want your computer time or what?"

The voice comes across like a bullhorn and he remains seated for just a second longer than he should. "If you'll excuse me." He stands to leave.

"I do want to interview you," she says.

"You have that one. Why do you need another?"

"Because I have the real deal here. The follow-up. This was just the warm-up. You're really in the game now. What's it like to be thousands of miles away from family and friends and doing this instead of putting away murderers?" She smiles and that 1000 watt something has returned. Full force. It's hard to look away.

"I've got an hour." Rank has privileges and he's been wanting to talk to Parker and Pops forever. It's been one of the things that has helped keep him focused. "If you're still here I can talk to you."

It's a slow nod. An understanding nod. "I'll avoid talking about her." She gives him an impish look. "But I won't say the same thing about white tigers."

With a few short strides, he's on the computer and logging in before he even sits. Within a minute the image springs on the screen and he's surprised to see Cam.

"Hey, big man. How are you?"

She's beautiful and luscious and so close and so far all at once. "Great," he chokes on the word. "Just great. What's up? You got my kid kidnapped by the new squints?"

Her smile is genuine and joyous. That's what he's been missing here. Joy. Pure joy. He's been sunk in misery and doubt and pain and sadness for far too long.

"I'm good, Camille. You look absolutely, wow."

She does that thing she does with her head that he likes, nods to the side and smiles. "Paul and I are going out tonight."

"He's treating you well?" She looks, well, loved.

"Absolutely. We're good."

"And Michelle?"

Her smile could not be brighter. "She's wonderful. I think."

He returns the smile. Cam often doubts how much good she does for Michelle as a parent. All she has to do is look at Bones to know that Michelle is lucky to have her. Bones lives in a state of emotional limbo because of what her parents did to her. "Then you're doing a good job, Cam." He levels his eyes with hers. "Doubt comes with the territory."

Cam nods, her lips pursed together as she often does, and cocks her head. "Dr. Brennan seemed a bit hurt that you couldn't be part of the link-up with the Jeffersonian."

He'd read the email—emails, actually- almost a full day after the jungles of Maluku became a broadcast hub to the world. Someone actually cared about the monkey man they were studying. He knew what was coming—Cam herself had alerted him. He knew the date and time and he could have easily have connected with the Maluku group and seen her. If he didn't read the emails until after, then he wasn't lying, was he?

It had taken every cell in his body not to read those emails until afterwards.

"Got busy, Camille. Maybe next time."

This time Cam is the one who is giving him the eye. "Avoiding only works for so long, Seeley. Hell, that woman will hunt you down if she wants to talk to you."

Somehow he doesn't doubt it although he knows that Brennan is more perceptive than some give her credit for. Than he gives her credit for. If he stops writing altogether will she get the message? Will he just be one of the many men who have rejected her over the years?

"I don't know what went on between you two, but I know that she appreciates honesty, Seeley. She deserves that much."

That he knows. The problem is he is not sure what the truth is anymore. He wants her but he doesn't want to want her. "Cam, just. . . just let it be. Okay?" Somehow he could hide what was going on between Brennan and him when he was right there in the same country. Thousands of miles away, Cam knows something is dangerously wrong between the two of them. He sighs and tries to smile. "Are you holding my kid for ransom or something?"

Cam does that thing she does, the single nod of her head and he knows she will bide her time, but the subject is not closed. "Parker's with Max Keenan and Hank. They've got a surprise for you."

"Tell them to hurry it up," he glances at his watch, "chop chop. I've only got 55 minutes."

As if by cue, the screen splits into two and he sees his kid. "Hey, Dad! Look who's here."

Hank eases onto the screen and for that magical moment, Booth believes that God is smiling on him. And the smile has got to be no better than the smiles he's getting from Parker and Pops.

"I'm going," Cam says and smiles, her eyes closing as they do, and instantly the screen widens into one scene and he sees slightly bigger versions of his kid and his grandfather.

"Hey, Shrimp."

"Pops."

He drinks them in. Two generations of Booths in one scene. Three generations connected by wires and satellites and electricity.

Their presence sparks something in him that he tries to hold inside, but it's hard.

"I gotta tell you something, Seeley, this place is unbelievable. Max gave us a tour. . . ."

"I've seen it before, Dad. Right?"

"Even took me down to the basement, you know, the place they call Limbo."

"Bone storage. Bones doesn't like calling it Limbo." Parker sounds like an authority.

His son, the squint. Rebecca wouldn't sign the permission slip. Parker hadn't sprouted underarm hair overnight, so he's not seen drawers upon drawers of skeletal remains. But his son sees science differently now—he sees school differently now. Thanks to Max Keenan.

Thanks to Bones.

The white tiger is circling in his mind.

"Showed me a bunch of bones from the Civil War. Imagine that, Seeley. And the big wars. Imagine that."

He should see Bones at work, reading bones. She's amazing he wants to say, but his grandfather wipes a tear from his eye and suddenly he can't remember the last time Hank's done that.

"That Temperance, when you talk to her, you tell her she does important work here. She needs to come home soon and well, you know." He peers at the screen with watery eyes. "I miss that gal. She's something else."

He's a softie at heart. Why else would he have taken in two boys and raise them?

His son is looking on with an admiration that he's not seen from the boys he's training here. Here it is deadly and serious and foreign. His grandfather is teary-eyed and proud. And here?

He wants to be anywhere but here. He wants to sweep up both of them into his arms and never let go.

"Pops, how's the nursing home treating you?"

He gets the rundown, names he recognizes, personalities his grandfather has told him about. For more than a moment, he's home with him, visiting the place, seeing the faces of the people he's met.

"Dad?"

Parker is innocence and enthusiasm and optimism and joy.

"I got something to show you. It's for my science fair project."

He produces a cluster of Lego blocks that looks vaguely like a human. "It's a robot, Dad. Watch."

With a shuffling step, the Lego man begins its ungainly march toward somewhere. This reminds him of that Christmas eons ago when Zach presented him with a robot that still sits on Parker's shelf. This reminds him of Bones and the ancient man she is studying and he wonders if his gait was similar when Malukiani man was first beginning to walk.

"Max helped me. Whatcha think?"

He cannot help but tell him in no uncertain terms that he is proud of him and he is grinning with that pride. And love.

They talk baseball and school and it is in this moment he realizes that his son won't be back in school until September. In a few weeks.

His son is building science fair projects during the summer. He's spending part of his summer in the forensic lab of the Jeffersonian learning how to make robots.

And he has Max to thank for that.

And Bones.

Somehow their lives have become woven together, inextricably linked by a design that constantly circles back to the beginning.

That truth is echoed in his grandfather's comments about the Jeffersonian and how he's grateful to Temperance for the letters. And the care package.

She's sending him things in the mail that she orders online and has shipped to him. She's checking in with him and making sure he is taking his medications. She is parenting the man who was his step-in-for-his-own-father father.

All at once Seeley Booth finds tears in his own eyes as his grandfather and his son remind him of a woman several time zones ahead of him, just 3,000 miles away.

It's Parker who punctuates that fact when he holds up a chunk of rock that Bones has sent to him from her island. It's lava and its light and pitted and scientific and cool.

She is still his village, still committed to helping raise his son.

"And we got to see Bones, Dad." Parker enthusiastically plows into the story of Bones and her bones and the video link and how he got to ask a question with all the other egghead scientists and they listened to his question and one of them told him it was really pretty smart and how Bones answered his question and smiled at him and made him feel as cool as all the other scientists.

It's August in Washington and his son is talking with scientists instead of playing baseball. It's August in Washington and his son is building science fair projects instead of riding his bike down the streets of his neighborhood.

And she is still his village. She is still parenting his son and watching over his grandfather.

Booth drinks in the sights of his son and his grandfather, his Parker and his Pops.

Parker is innocence and light and possibility. He is being brought up by love and peace and joy.

And Pops? He gives him a knowing look, tells him to thank Temperance the next time he writes her, tells him to talk to her. "She's missing you as much as you're missing her, Shrimp. Believe me."

It is Parker who puts an exclamation point on that idea as he salutes him and tells him that he misses him.

And Bones. His son misses his partner.

And as Parker signs off with a promise to write and Booth watches as the screen goes to black and someone is yelling toward him that his time is up, he realizes that he is more confused. The white tiger is still in his thoughts, growling at him as it paws the ground.

In three months there has been nothing in her letters or emails that suggest that she has changed her mind. She has learned nothing new about her own humanity.

Thousands of miles away it becomes easier to make this decision. He can ignore her letters, her emails. He can ignore the real time meeting with the site team and the satellite phone messages and all the other ways in which people can stay connected in this global village they have become.

He makes his way back to the mess hall and to the table and he notices that she hasn't moved.

Her name is Carrie. Carrie Ann Schneider. And she's a reporter who wants to interview him.

"You've got duty in, what, three hours? You probably want to get some shut-eye."

But nothing could be further from the truth. Seeing Parker and Pops has energized him. He wants to talk. He wants to tell someone what he's been thinking these past several weeks.

He doesn't want that tiger, that damned white tiger to appear when he closes his eyes.

For a man as guarded as he is about some things, he wants this. He wants to talk.

And there is someone here, right here, who wants to listen.

"You wanted an interview?"

It's an open door. He makes that one decisive nod of his head and that is all she needs.

The letter he has been trying to write for the past several days remains unwritten. In it he wants to tell Brennan just how much he wants her. Just how much he wants them.

And just how much he needs to move on is she doesn't feel the same way.

As he begins to answer Carrie's questions, he realizes that he can continue to push Brennan further and further from his mind. He has to. She is part of the fabric of his life, but she is not everything. He cannot keep wearing her because her presence is wearing away at him.

He loves her, but he can't have enough love for the two of them.

And he ignores the white tiger pacing in the corner of his thoughts.

It's the best he can do.


	2. The Scorpion

Most mornings she rises before the others in camp, prepares herself a cup of tea in the kitchen tent and sits in the waning darkness to await the dawn.

She knows it makes no logical sense to maintain this ritual, to watch the sunrise color the jungle slowly with its broad brushstrokes. She knows the few minutes she sits watching the daybreak could be better spent on administrative duties or tackling the correspondence that only seems to grow exponentially overnight.

She knows it is the time difference that breeds the emails that flood her inbox. She knows the circumference of the earth coupled with its rotation and the fixed nature of the sun have led men to develop time zones to help in understanding the construct of time wherever one might be on the planet. In simpler terms, she knows that while she sleeps, someone else is awake and aware of what she and the Maluku project team is doing here to unlock the mystery of an early hominid.

She also knows that as the sun rises here on Maluku it will be another two and a half hours before the sun rises over Afghanistan, five before the sun's rays touch Paris, and another 11 before Washington D.C. sees the sun breaking over the horizon.

In the five months she has been on Maluku, she has found some comfort in this knowledge.

Seeking answers in the bones of ancient peoples once gave her clarity. Once she could force her mind to synthesize and analyze and evaluate and it obeyed. Once she could declare an unconditional truce in the battle between an avalanche of emotions and her very powerful brain.

Pragmatism and rationalism usually won out over raw emotions. It is how she survived the disappearance of her parents, her brother's leaving. Years in the foster care system.

But no more.

In five months she has been unable to completely dismiss the sadness and pain that has followed her from Washington. In five months she has been unable to quell the worry about Booth's safety. In five months she still has no true understanding of what her partnership with Booth means.

It is simply because in five months she has not been able to bury how she feels about Booth.

But she can seal off those feelings with the help of this morning routine, this morning cleansing. Like an alcoholic, an addict, she finds the strength for one more day of control. One more day spent trying to plug that damned dam that seems to sprout even more leaks in her resolve.

In five months she can only muster enough strength of will for 24 hours at a time.

oOo

Most mornings Daisy Wick finds her sitting on one of the camp chairs looking toward the East, toward a new day. Blessedly, the young graduate student often simply appears and allows the day to break in silence before peppering the air with her words.

But not always.

This morning she has found a new vehicle for an old avenue. "Dr. Brennan, you are my inspiration. Of all the people working on this project, you are the most devoted. I don't think anyone else puts in as many hours working as you do."

Most mornings the intrusion on her routine is just that—unwelcome and unwanted. But this morning when Brennan's conclusions are threatening to allow the emotions victory, she embraces the distraction.

"Good morning, Miss Wick."

Brennan understands social conventions although many of the finer points are lost on her. She knows that without a doubt, Miss Wick is one of the best graduate students on the site and surely one of the most annoying. But in five months time she has learned to block the more challenging of her traits and has concentrated on only trying to develop the mind of the young woman.

This approach has paid dividends although she wonders if it will ever be enough.

"It's just so inspiring, Dr. Brennan. It's in your nature to rise early and work late. To do all the things that you do in this camp." The young woman's enthusiasm has waxed and waned, but today it seems to have found renewed substance in what Dr. Lance Sweets would call hero worship and Brennan girds her defenses. She cannot afford to put too much stock in the compliments of this young woman. Truth is found in science, she tells herself, not in people.

"It's just, well, you know. That story Dr. Fahti told last night. The one about the tiger and the scorpion?" Daisy takes a breath and Brennan is too certain she knows what the woman will say. "It's just so you. You are just so, well, it is in your nature to work as hard as you do even though you are just so brilliant. You don't just rely on your intellect, you also have a strong work ethic that makes you just so, so special!"

The last word is delivered with enough energy to startle a black-capped lorry from its perch and Brennan allows herself to watch the bird escape.

She has heard the story under different circumstances, its telling tinged by cultural and local adaptations, perhaps populated with different creatures, but the meaning remains the same.

A white tiger is asked by a scorpion to transport it across a river. The tiger objects, fearful that the scorpion will revert to its true nature and sting it before it reaches the farthest shore. The scorpion convinces the tiger it will do nothing of the sort, but halfway across the river, the scorpion fatally stings the tiger. When the tiger asks why as they are both about to drown, the scorpion gives the only answer it can—"It is what I am. It is all I can do."

Despite the idea of two decidedly different species being able to communicate with one another as being utterly absurd, and the prospect of the two creatures cobbling together a symbiotic relationship of this sort as impossible, Dr. Temperance Brennan understands the meaning of the story.

She understands it too well.

Here on Maluku, she has returned to what she is, what she can do. She is shoulder-to-shoulder with other anthropologists seeking answers to life's riddle of evolution. At least one graduate student has proclaimed this the "find of the century", but she has emphatically unwoven that misconception: "The century still has another 90 years of possible finds that, given the likelihood of advances in imaging technologies as well as methods of analyzing data would preclude this particular find from being the definitive 'find' of this century."

While it is not the only find for this century, she is constantly reminded of its importance by scientists who want access to their research or graduate students wanting to rotate into the project or journalists seeking information for their publications. Theirs is a find of great importance in the study of man's evolutionary trail and she is one of the scientists whose name will forever be linked to it.

She is not just writing history, she is making it.

But on this island where early man's origins can still teach so much about the what it means to be human, it is Seeley Joseph Booth who occupies her mind, lurking at the edges of her thoughts like the white tiger, pacing constantly.

She sips her tea, certain of only one truth in Miss Wick's words.

She, Temperance Brennan, is the scorpion.

oOo

"It's your decision ultimately. Women have been productive well into their last trimester. Chinese rice paddy workers would actually give birth in the fields they were planting so as to not disrupt the planting cycle."

One glance shows that she has said something that is amusing to Dr. Whittaker and she stores this away to be examined later.

This is one of the dozens of different tasks she is being called upon to do today. Dr. Fahti has doubts about the bone fragments they located the other day while Dr. Webster has indicated he cannot stay beyond the end of the week. The geologist wants equipment that seems forever stalled in Melbourne while at least two of the graduate students will have to take the place of Dr. Caswell who was airlifted off the island with a compound fracture of his right femur. Ostensibly, she is in charge of an archaeological dig. But as Dr. Whittaker is prone to say, she is in charge of the life of the dig.

Given that Dr. Whittaker is a medical doctor and the woman is prone to metaphor, Brennan weighs her words with some care.

For now the young woman standing before her is her real focus. Brennan does not see a pregnancy as a crisis although the young woman's tears and nervousness would suggest otherwise. She assures the young grad student that while ill-timed, her pregnancy is a complication, not a reason to dismiss her.

"I'd really, really like to stay, Dr. Brennan. Our work here is the foundation of my doctoral dissertation."

Brennan understands the pursuit of information, the relentless need to amass data, to understand the essence of something at its very core and so this decision is welcome. She approves, too, of Dr. Whittaker's precautions to the young graduate student's diet and physical activities. The woman visibly relaxes and Brennan notes this information. She is trying to pay more attention to people and how they act and react.

Within a few moments, one potentially uncomfortable situation is replaced by Dr. Whittaker's congratulations on a good decision.

Brennan doesn't understand why she deserves congratulations for coming up with a very rational conclusion.

"Pregnancy is not a disease," Brennan says.

Dr. Whittaker crosses her arms in front of her and nods her head. The woman even gives her a smile. Brennan is reminded of Dr. Camille Saroyan and how the coroner's bodily movements are similar to the Maluku project's on-site physician. "I was just saying that I agreed with your decision to allow Miss Keaton to stay on with us. She's a valuable member of our team and she's quite capable of contributing to the research efforts even pregnant."

Brennan reiterates that the doctoral candidate might have been better prepared for the possibility of pregnancy. "It is not rational," Brennan points out. "What with the availability of birth control even on this island."

"I wonder why she didn't drag in the father-to-be as well." Dr. Whittaker seems as concerned about this as the young woman's decision to have unprotected sex.

Brennan is surprised that she knows who the father is or, at least, can posit a viable supposition. Her morning and evening walks through the camp have provided her with much valuable information about the people there although she rarely actively thinks about any of it. She merely stores the information to be examined later when its importance becomes relevant.

"You know, don't you?"

"Is it important?"

Dr. Whittaker, she realizes later, much later, thinks she is being discreet, but Brennan knows she is only concerned about what is rational. "Women have often found themselves a single parent charged with rearing their offspring or have banded together to provide a strong, social network in which to raise their children."

Anthropology has provided answers and she knows the march of humankind will continue despite the young woman's rash decision.

"The last dig that Charles and I worked was run by a man and he sent the women home as fast as he could." Dr. Whittaker and her husband are veterans of many of his digs. "He thought pregnancy to be some sort of affliction." Again, Brennan is reminded of how fortunate it was that the Whittakers were available for this particular project. Both have been supportive.

Brennan takes a deep breath and tries to analyze this and is reminded of what many people have said to her over the years—her brain processes information at a faster rate than others. Dr. Whittaker is only now catching up with what she had known were major factors in reaching her decision about the young grad student.

"We may have a few more pregnancies before this is over."

Statistically possible, Brennan agrees. In the early hours she has heard the noises in the tents as she makes her own way toward the building which houses their supplies and communications gear—the soft shuffling, whispers, the rhythmic creaks accompanied by sighs and moans and talking and laughter.

Her morning walk does nothing to quell her erotic dreams and the decidedly aching need in her body.

She knows it is a by-product of celibacy. But even she acknowledges it is not that simple.

Dr. Whittaker is more concerned about her own more visible aches and she submits to an impromptu examination of the injuries that she sustained the other day. While momentarily distracted, one of the archaeologists stumbled and crashed into her, sending them both tumbling down a steep hill. She'd been clutching an ossified femur during her fall and had earned a round of applause for protecting the ancient remains at the expense of her own body.

She did not understand the need for the applause.

She knows just how stiff and aching her body is, just how wretchedly painful her left ankle is, but she submits to Dr. Whittaker's exam anyway. The bruises along her left hip and the scrapes that line her legs are still tender to the touch, but she tries to hide just how sore she is from the doctor's probing fingers. She has too much work to do to be injured.

"Dr. Caswell is still in hospital for a few more days," Whittaker says before she levels her eyes with Brennan's. "I'm inclined to send you to Jakarta for some R&R. Except," she says as she helps Brennan straighten her shirt to cover the injuries on her back, "you are far too valuable here."

That is not a compliment, but a fact and Brennan is not inclined to thank her for stating the obvious. The organizers of the dig have already asked her to extend her involvement with the project.

She has declined staying on-site for longer than the year she has promised.

The decision surprises her as much as it disappoints the organizers.

"You run a good site, Temperance," the doctor says before moving onto her next call.

Brennan sits down at the desk and begins the relentless task of dealing with the correspondence, which takes up nearly the entire morning in which she could be on-site working. There are letters and emails to be answered from scientists, requests from journalists seeking information, reports to be filed with the foundation backing the project.

And then there is the personal correspondence.

In the past she only had correspondence that had been a necessary part of whatever she had been working on. For years she had had no family and her friendships were few. It occurred to her one afternoon when others were sleeping through the midday heat and she was trying to answer a question from her niece that she did indeed have family and friends who cared enough to want some contact with her. Haley's question had spurred her on to write a long reply that, had she some idea of the workings of a young girl's mind she might not have answered with such detail and precision. She had never truly understood the subtle layers behind a question, often merely assessing the words at face value and attempting to address what she could hear in the query rather than what she could not.

Her reply was several pages in length when she was done.

Haley surprised her by asking more questions, hungry, it seemed, for information about the dig and what they found in Indonesia. What started as a simple question had grown into an exchange of letters that surprised her because she found that she craved them and enjoyed trying to make her answers clear for her niece.

While she gave the correspondence required of her as much attention as the personal letters and emails, she found she much preferred writing her family and friends.

Russ wrote her sporadically, usually in an email that poured out lots of information about the family or their father. Her father, ever careful in their relationship, made sure she got a weekly email or letter, often accompanied by photos of his young scientists gathered around their experiments or a photo of Russ and his girls.

Angela's weekly missives arrived on postcards purchased on the spur of the moment, sent to her from various art museums and shops throughout Paris. The images from the Louvre and the Maison Europeenne de la Photographie and Musée Marmottan-Claude Monet stood out in stark contrast to the bareness of her tent, but she hung them up if only to remain herself of a friend she cherished.

Booth's letters and emails were more sporadic than even Russ'. She attributed this to the fact that of all of the people she corresponded with, his time was the most limited and regimented.

When she got them, infrequent as they were, she devoured them.

Yet they never fully satisfied her.

oOo

She cannot deny that she loves Booth. Even thousands of miles away, Angela helps her sort through the vague and unsettling feelings that leave her sleepless and off balance. Miles apart, when she can simply press a button and disconnect from Angela or retreat into herself or walk away, she is so desperate for answers that she maintains the connection despite the discomfort.

"You need to tell him, Sweetie. Tell him how you feel."

"Ange. . . ."

"He's in a war zone. He needs to know that he's got you to come home to, Brennan. He wants to come home to you."

"He's got Parker and Hank. . . ."

"And you." Angela's face is intense and she won't back down on this. Her own love for Jack Hodgins has given her a strength and a stubbornness that Brennan has rarely seen but can practically feel through the computer screen. Nothing is logical anymore. She and Angela have had conversations like this before, but this one is different; Angela's insistence is different. "He's got you. If you let him."

"It's not that easy, Angela. I can't just tell him." The words terrify her.

"Brennan, you have all the signs. You are constantly worried about him. You can't think of not having him in your life. . . ."

"I've felt like that for a long time, Angela."

"You've loved him for a long time, Brennan."

oOo

While she is a best-selling author as well as a world-renown forensic anthropologist, she is not someone who actively seeks out the ironies in life, but she knows that she is as immersed in irony as she is knee-deep in an archaeological site.

For a woman who claims to not know how to change, she finds that she has changed a great deal.

The excitement that should be hers is tempered by how much she misses the people in her life. Her brother and his wife and kids are on her mind as is her father. And while she knows that Angela and Hodgins are intimately ensconced in their Paris yearlong honeymoon and her friend is only a letter or phone call or email away, she still misses her. And Hodgins. She misses him, too.

But it is Booth who occupies her mind the most, lurking at the edges of her thoughts like the white tiger, pacing constantly. Waiting to see if she will cross the river with him.

Those feelings have seeped into her very bones and make her ache with longing and need.

The sadness and the pain that she thought to leave behind in Washington D.C. has followed her. The nightmares that troubled her sleep at home have lessened here thousands of miles from their source, but they still rumble through her nights at times and leave her breathless and spent. The worry is still there.

She worries about Booth's safety. She worries that her admission of love will only drive a deeper wedge between them. She worries that she will only disappoint him.

She has no empirical evidence to suggest otherwise: Booth might be the white tiger fording the river; she is the scorpion.

Angela's words echo in her mind—_tell him how you feel_. They are the same whispered words in her own voice that have clouded her mind since that night outside the Hoover.

For years she wondered what was wrong with her and she has seen and read and experienced enough to know that she is damaged. Men have come and gone and more than one has told her she is emotionally distant. She had few friends growing up—her shyness and her intelligence worked against her bonding with others outside her family. Then, her parents abandoned her. Her brother left. Foster families passed her along like a used, unwanted book, often more scuffed up and worry-worn than before. She made no lasting connections to people in high school. In college, too fearful of rejection, she had concentrated on her academic work and accepted the collegial relationships offered by her professors.

She is well aware of her limitations. She knows that if she relents, if she takes that step toward Booth, they are both doomed.

Men have come and gone from her life. They do not return.

If she takes that step with Booth, she will destroy him. She will destroy them.

And as much as she wants to take that step with Booth, as much as her body aches for him, as much as her mind craves his company, she loves him too much to do that to him.


	3. Drowning

She finally promises Angela that she will tell Booth how she feels. Later she attributes it to the loneliness or the enforced celibacy or Angela's insistence or the fact that her best friend is pregnant. Dr. Temperance Brennan who prides herself on knowing and understanding cannot pinpoint what it is that makes her capitulate, but she agrees to tell Booth. All at once she is frightened and relieved.

She finds the combination of feelings to be uncomfortable.

"Sweetie, he's three gadzillion miles away. He wants this."

"Ange, given that I don't know exactly where he is located and my own coordinates differ by as much as. . . ."

"Bren, it's hyperbole. An exaggeration."

Angela's pregnancy stirs up feelings of jealousy. Perhaps irrational feelings conjure up irrational actions, but she agrees it is time. Five months in and she wants to know if this will fatally sting him, them, or if she has been fooling herself all along.

There is logic in telling him. Their partnership had been tattered and worn. Angela is right—telling him cannot tear it apart further unless he has changed his mind. It is what he wanted. It might just repair the rips in their relationship.

Booth has navigated relationships before. He will help her. Five years of a close partnership proves that they can overcome much together.

She's just not sure. Something this big requires more than a weighing of the pros and cons. It requires a leap of faith, but faith is something she lost years ago.

And something else has been niggling away at her thoughts for some time and she has no words to describe it.

"Brennan, you're the one who told me that nothing in this world only happens once. You told me that I would find love again." Angela is fierce, a mother tiger. Protective. Demanding. "Booth loves you. He wants this. You want this."

She remembers the desert and the desolation of her friend and she falls prey to the joy radiating from her computer screen. Irrational feelings conjure up irrational thoughts and she allows the two people beaming at her from Paris to guide her. Angela knows love and she's helped her make sense of what has not made sense for so long that she is almost weary with holding onto the words.

"Write it down if you have to. Read it to him if you must. But just say it to him. He made the first move before, Sweetie. You have to make the next move."

oOo

It is Dr. Camille Saroyan who lets it slip that Booth is seeing someone. Five months in Afghanistan, and Booth has found a way to move on.

Each month Brennan does an update for the foundation funding the project and it is uplinked to various institutions. They are a global village, Brennan is reminded, and she has an obligation to feed this village with the knowledge her group has gained.

While she finds the metaphor suspect, she accedes to the demands of her position and provides a visual tour of the site every month featuring some new discovery that her team wants to highlight. She knows that it is a means to an end—they can use these updates to make pleas for more funding. She understands that a 3.6 million-year-old skeleton is not of great importance to many people although she does feel more than a twinge of excitement in its presence. This month the Jeffersonian is hosting the uplink.

Instead of the Jeffersonian technician handling the duties at the institution, her father's image appears and she drinks him in. "Hey, there's my girl. There's that smile." He quickly fills her in on what he's been doing and before she can ask any questions, her brother Russ appears on the screen.

"We're in town for Haley's quarterly physical. Dad thought this would be a way for us to see you. Catch up a bit. But apparently you don't have the satellite for long so this is about it for now."

The hour is late in Maluku, but she is touched by the thoughtfulness of her father and her brother. This is Russ, her big brother who helped her navigate the uncertainties of her childhood, her big brother who seems genuinely happy to see her now. Emotion comes unbidden and she realizes that something has changed in her. She swipes at a tear.

"We know you don't have much time on this contraption, honey, you've got to do your song and dance for the patrons, but we have someone else here who would like to say hi to you." Her father has reappeared and blows her a kiss and she almost wishes she believes that she could catch it and hold it for a moment when Cam appears on screen.

"Dr. Brennan, I just wanted you to know that I've seen much of the footage your group has sent out and I have to say that it is quite impressive. This is truly a great discovery."

She wants to correct her, tell her that the dig itself will yield up only some of the information that will inform the science for years, it will be the follow-up research that will have the most bearing on the scientific community, but she says nothing, too pleased to see her. Too pleased that she wants to see her.

"You really are missed here. All of you are. I also wanted to tell you that Booth is fine, I talked to him the other day and he's actually met someone over in Afghanistan. Leave it to Seeley."

For that moment she feels lightheaded and weightless just as she had seconds after Dr. Caswell's feet became tangled in her own and he sent them both crashing down that hill the other day leaving them both bruised and scraped raw from their tumble.

The connection ends before she can say anything, do anything. She sits stunned, bruised and scraped raw by this tumble down a metaphorical hill.

The evidence comes into clear focus now—for every three emails or letters she's sent Booth, she has received one. His letters are general comments about the training or complaints about the routine. She cannot hear his voice through his letters although she knows that is impossible. His replies do not reference what she has written about although most of the other letters she has received from her friends and family be considered written conversations. He knew about the video link a few months back—Cam had let that one slip, too—so he did not want to see it. See her.

He is doing now what he had done before. That night, after telling Sweets about their first case, Booth had made that first step toward them. _Toward us._

And she had forced them both to step backwards.

He is doing that thing he did, holding himself distant from her. She did more lab work than she had done in years simply because he did not take her with him to interview witnesses and interrogate suspects. She knew what he was doing, but she said nothing to stop him. She needed the distance as well.

He said he was moving on, and Seeley Booth does not lie to her. He said things had to change.

And they have.

It is Daisy who catches her in that moment of weakness. "Dr. Brennan, are you all right? I imagine seeing your brother and father was like having only one bite of a really good piece of chocolate. And being in the tropics as you know, it is virtually impossible to really get a good piece of chocolate unless, of course, you don't mind that it is melted in the heat and all. And you've put in a very full day working as you do so I imagine you are pretty tired. But we've got to do the update live from Maluku, well, it's not entirely live since we're. . . ."

She schools her mind and begins to make another connection as the young woman prattles on. Booth's new woman is the independent journalist who flew in last month to do a follow-up story for the Washington _Journal_.

She has no hard evidence, but she knows. She knows just as she knew that Heather Taffet was responsible for burying her alive. For burying Hodgins. Trapping Booth.

She knows just as she knew that Zach Addy had betrayed them all by assisting Gormogon. She knows.

oOo

In the sixth month she gets her first phone call from Booth. Later Angela will speculate that he found out about Cam's slip, but Brennan has become good at hiding her feelings again and pretends to ignore her friend's comments.

Angela is good at reading people, and if it is something that Brennan has been trying to do while she is in Indonesia, it is trying to read people.

This is Booth, though, and she finds that even after six months, she can still read him. He looks tired and uncertain. Wary. He has bad news and he is not sure how she will take it.

She resists the urge to touch the computer screen and ease some of the tension on his face just as she reneges on her promise to Angela to tell Booth how she feels.

This is Booth and she will not intrude on his happiness.

He is surprised when she brings up Carrie Ann Schneider. She does not tell him that the only reason she remembers her name is because her father has sent her the newspaper article from Washington. The article focuses more on Booth and his story, but there is enough mention of the Maluku project, which, Brennan surmises, justified the woman's six-hour trip to the island.

"I'm glad for you, Booth. You deserve to be happy and it is good that you were able to find someone for which you have a rapport."

She does not mention sex because she knows it will simply make him uncomfortable. But she is happy for him. He does deserve happiness.

He seems visibly relieved that she has broached the subject and the conversation, though somewhat stilted, seems to go well enough. He asks about the dig and about her father and Angela and Hodgins. She asks about his work and about Hank and about Parker, although her father keeps her informed about the youngest Booth and she has sent Parker artifacts from Maluku. She has received a letter in reply for each one she has sent to Hank and to Parker.

Neither talk of their partnership or the coffee cart or murders.

He promises to try to call her in a couple of weeks.

And he startles her. "I've missed you, Bones. I really have."

She tells him that she has missed him as well.

"I'll call you, Bones. Friday, is next Friday good for you?" He gives her a time, tells her he'll sign up.

She sketches a nod and his image disappears.

And the sadness and the pain hit her full force.

oOo

Cam apologies from 7000 miles away but it is not enough. "Seeley, don't put this all on me. How the hell am I supposed to know what I should or shouldn't say is going on with you when you're thousands of miles away?"

He has gone almost six months without talking to Bones and he feels her absence, but he wants this relationship with Carrie to work. He wants to give them a chance.

That's why he's a little flustered and more than angry when Carrie returns from one of her trips and tells him that she interviewed Dr. Brennan.

He knows when his hand is being forced.

The women in his life are conspiring against him and he is so uncertain of facing Brennan that he almost breaks the connection on his computer before she can appear. His leg bounces and he flips his poker chip in one hand to prevent it from closing the screen. He is angry at Cam and furious with Carrie, but he knows whom he should blame.

When Brennan's face appears, he does not want to lose sight of her. Her cheekbones are more prominent than he remembered, her hair lighter, longer. She is sun-kissed and beautiful even without makeup. He tries to keep the conversation light and he tries to bring up safe topics, but it is Brennan who beards the lion and tells him she approves of Carrie.

"How did you. . . ?" he sputters. He wonders just how long it took Angela to put the pieces together. He wonders how she got the pieces.

"She came straight from Afghanistan, Booth. She mentioned you. I assume there are more Booths in the country given the size of the American and British forces over there, but I think it's safe to say there is only one Sergeant Major Seeley Booth formerly of the FBI quartered in Kabul."

"Cam also said you had met someone." She pauses and he wonders what else she can hit him with. "Did I get it wrong?"

He tries to gauge her reaction, but she seems genuinely pleased that he is happily engaged in a relationship. Her words are overly formal yet endearing, and he knows she does not readily lie, so he understands she is truly happy for him.

"You needed time and space, Booth." She is direct. She is trying to make this easier on him. Only later will he realize that she is the only woman who will make this easy on him. "I understand. You needed to work things out."

Waves of guilt wash over him and he can't help but promise her that he will call her in a couple of weeks.

When the screen goes black and she is gone, he realizes instantly that he wants to call her back.

oOo

She does not need Dr. Sweets or Booth or Angela to tell her about her nature. The people in the camp remind her of who she is.

Utterly scrupulous. Hard working. Honest. Professional. Brilliant.

And cold. Remote.

She is true to her nature. She opens up their research to the world of scientists eager to understand early man. She provides access to their images and sends out casts of the bones to researchers in Australia and England and France and the United States. She protects the remains they have found and supervises how they are packed and shipped to Jakarta and sends Daisy and Dr. Whittaker with each set to maintain the high standards of vigilance. She stays up late her makeshift office lit by solar batteries as she makes contact with researchers in different time zones scattered across the world to analyze and to evaluate what this new discovery means to understanding humans.

She continues to wake before dawn and sit through the sunrises on the island, sipping her morning tea, trying to center herself for the long day she will put in. She dismisses the erotic dreams as a by-product of celibacy. She dismisses the nightmares.

For years she found ways to balance the demands of her job at the Jeffersonian as well as working with the FBI and writing novels and consulting and teaching. She finds ways to balance the demands here as well. One afternoon while waiting for a phone call from London, she actually begins to outline another book. She composes letters in her head and organizes her thoughts for a research paper she's been working on. She considers writing a colleague about a theory she has regarding bone ossification.

It is easier, she tells herself, to be alone.

Eight months into a year-long commitment, she has slipped back into her old self. Like a glove, but it is not a glove. It fits, but there are holes worn away by time and circumstances. And those damned metaphorical marks Booth talked of once. They have left holes, too. She wants those to fade.

But they may never fade.

The feelings remain, but she is tamping them down, replacing them with work. She has been asked to read several dissertations and research papers. The anthropological society in Australia wants her to speak on the Maluku find. The anthropologists in Jakarta want her as well. The police force there wants to discuss forensic techniques. _National Geographic _wants a site visit for an article and film crews from the Discovery channel want access as well.

She still worries about Booth. Her friends. Her family.

But mostly about Booth.

She still enjoys writing to her nieces and her brother and her father and her friends.

When Booth calls her every other week now, she hears the happiness in his voice. He is teasing her more. They bicker more. He tries to cajole her into a smile, a small laugh.

"You're working too hard, Bones," he tells her.

But work is not enough. It may never be enough.

Carrie can and does watch over him. She tells him to be careful, watches his back with the Army brass. Comforts him when he misses Christmas with Parker. Celebrates his birthday. Makes plans with him to return to Washington.

And Brennan knows that is how it should be. Angela tries to argue with her, tries to bully her into admitting her feelings still, but there is comfort in knowing that she cannot hurt Booth. She will not sting him and drown him with her love.

She loves him. She loves him too much to do that to him.

To them.


End file.
